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Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

nautil.us

41–50 of 89 posts

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#41
post #5

I'm still wondering why space is 3-dimensional.

Your perception of space is 3-dimensional.

The mathematics that model space fit conveniently in 3 dimensions without becoming unmanageably complex.

However, by employing additional dimensions, particularly dimensions in which the basis vector multiplied by itself is a product other than itself, you can sometimes simplify the math that describes portions of the universe to a shocking extent. For instance, using geometric algebra with one dimension that squares to positive one and three that square to negative one, Maxwell's Equations reduce to "nabla field_bivector = free_space_permeability * speed_of_light * current_vector".

Sometimes, introducing special-purpose dimensions with interesting geometries and constraints upon the multidimensional representation makes certain types of math easier. For instance, conformal representation employs two dimensions that square to zero to represent the origin and infinity, and regular space is represented as a curved subset of the hyperdimensional space. Otherwise complicated operations become simpler, as a translation and rotation through dimensions that do not exist that almost coincidentally lands the result right back on the constrained hypersurface that represents 3-dimensional space.

When we invent these extra dimensions for the purposes of doing the math, we have no good way of knowing whether they are entirely imaginary or just undetectable and inaccessible to us at our current level of technology. If the universe had a round dimension with a diameter of less than the Planck distance, we would not be able to detect it, because we can't measure a distance that small. But maybe certain properties in the particle zoo can be more easily explained using an angular phase value on a tiny round dimension perpendicular to everything else.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#42

Spinning motion is an illusion and doesn't exist as a fundamental form of movement, similar to how lack of gravity in orbit is an illusion, in that you are continuously falling downward but missing the earth. Spinning objects are made of particles that are all actually going in straight lines but forces against each other are causing them to change direction, cummulatively appearing to be spinning, like an extremely…

I am actually not sure that this is true. I used to think exactly like you, that rotations are just piles of small translations with time varying directions, but there is a problem with this, linear momentum and angular momentum are two different conserved quantities. If it were the case that rotations are just translations then you should be able to get rid of angular momentum and its conservation and explain it in terms of linear momentum and I don't think that you can do that. Linear momentum is tied to the homogeneity of space while angular momentum is tight to the isotropy of space. You could actually do the exact opposite, say that translations are just rotations about a point infinitely far away, but I think that won't work either. I really don't know for sure, I mean I am not really, really, really confident about it, but as far as I can tell rotations and translations are fundamentally different.

Unaccelerated translations make only sense as relations between two objects but you don't need any reference to detect acceleration, you can just release an object from your hand and see if it drops to the floor because of gravity, hits the wall behind you because your space ship is accelerating or flies away tangentially because you are on a carousel. Rotation requires continuous acceleration (I am avoiding the term constant acceleration because only the magnitude is constant but not the direction) of all the particles towards the center of rotation or otherwise they would fly away tangentially. But if rotation requires continuous acceleration and you can always detect acceleration without reference to some other outside objects then you can always detect rotations and that is not true for translations, you can not detect unaccelerated translations.

It is the difference between velocities and accelerations and the fact that rotations always require accelerations that makes rotations more than just a pile of translations. You won't notice any difference if you translate everything in space by the same amount, you won't see any change if you rotate everything in space by the same amount, there is also no difference if you change the velocity of everything by the same amount but you will immediately notice if you change the acceleration of everything.

Or maybe that is at least partially nonsense, unfortunately I haven't yet mastered that topic myself.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#43
Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#44

Spinning motion is an illusion and doesn't exist as a fundamental form of movement, similar to how lack of gravity in orbit is an illusion, in that you are continuously falling downward but missing the earth. Spinning objects are made of particles that are all actually going in straight lines but forces against each other are causing them to change direction, cummulatively appearing to be spinning, like an extremely…

So you're saying there's a final fractional digit to PI? That's good news.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#45

The question "would space still exist if matter disappeared" is posed with an ontological bias which influences the answer. A better question is: does a universe in which there is nothing (and never has been) still contain space? (Though a better question, I wrecked it by introducing "never", which presupposes that the universe has time---even though it contains nothing, and therefore no events take place.) The quest…

How about this question: Is there a space with no matter?

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#46
post #44

Spinning motion is an illusion and doesn't exist as a fundamental form of movement, similar to how lack of gravity in orbit is an illusion, in that you are continuously falling downward but missing the earth. Spinning objects are made of particles that are all actually going in straight lines but forces against each other are causing them to change direction, cummulatively appearing to be spinning, like an extremely…

So you're saying there's a final fractional digit to PI? That's good news.

That's a non sequitur.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#47
post #32

Spinning motion is an illusion and doesn't exist as a fundamental form of movement, similar to how lack of gravity in orbit is an illusion, in that you are continuously falling downward but missing the earth. Spinning objects are made of particles that are all actually going in straight lines but forces against each other are causing them to change direction, cummulatively appearing to be spinning, like an extremely…

Physicists are rather aware of these things, seeing as you they are the ones who taught them to you in the first place. This is an old, venerable question that, as the article says, dates back to before Einsteinian relativity and remain unresolved to this day. Physics 101 is not capable of resolving the matter.

Appeal to authority is worse than actually trying to figure out a problem from first principles, especially in the field of physics.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#48
post #29

Spinning motion is an illusion and doesn't exist as a fundamental form of movement, similar to how lack of gravity in orbit is an illusion, in that you are continuously falling downward but missing the earth. Spinning objects are made of particles that are all actually going in straight lines but forces against each other are causing them to change direction, cummulatively appearing to be spinning, like an extremely…

Suppose your object is the only thing in space, how do you tell that it is spinning? How do the particles in the object can tell that the object as a whole is spinning? What you describe are particules going in straight lines, but over what space/grid are they going on a straight lines? If they are going over straight lines on something then your description is one of an objective space. If pulling forces are still e…

They are going in straight lines in relation to the other particles in the object. Then the force of one particle exerts on another particle as they get closer or further from each other, causing them to change direction. This happens for innumerable numbers of particles, appearing like a singular object that is spinning, since the forces are too great to pull the object apart. If you spin it fast enough, the particles will overcome the atomic forces holding it together, and the object will break apart, with the individual pieces continuing to move in a straight line.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#49
post #42

Spinning motion is an illusion and doesn't exist as a fundamental form of movement, similar to how lack of gravity in orbit is an illusion, in that you are continuously falling downward but missing the earth. Spinning objects are made of particles that are all actually going in straight lines but forces against each other are causing them to change direction, cummulatively appearing to be spinning, like an extremely…

I am actually not sure that this is true. I used to think exactly like you, that rotations are just piles of small translations with time varying directions, but there is a problem with this, linear momentum and angular momentum are two different conserved quantities. If it were the case that rotations are just translations then you should be able to get rid of angular momentum and its conservation and explain it in…

Angular momentum is an abstract concept, and an emergent property. It doesn't exist inherently in an object.

Re: Why Understanding Space Is So Hard

#50

The question "would space still exist if matter disappeared" is posed with an ontological bias which influences the answer. A better question is: does a universe in which there is nothing (and never has been) still contain space? (Though a better question, I wrecked it by introducing "never", which presupposes that the universe has time---even though it contains nothing, and therefore no events take place.) The quest…

I've struggled several times to formulate this question properly. I'm not convinced by your formulation. I'll give it an other try.

Does space have an existence per se, that is regardless of the matter it contains, or is it just a mathematical framework for the interactions between particles?

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